


all art is quite useless

by postcardmystery



Category: White Collar
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-04-13
Updated: 2013-04-13
Packaged: 2017-12-08 08:09:46
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 683
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/759089
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/postcardmystery/pseuds/postcardmystery
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Neal wanted to be a good man, once. He even thought he could be a great man, the FBI's pet felon, an invisible collar around his neck, Peter yanking gently on the chain. (That's not fair to Peter, but Neal's become more spiteful lately.)</p>
            </blockquote>





	all art is quite useless

**Author's Note:**

> Trigger warning for child neglect.

Neal Caffrey is a conman, this is what everybody says. True; wrong. Neal Caffrey is a petty thief, who learnt to be an art thief, who learnt to run a seven man con without breaking a sweat. Neal Caffrey is the nineteen year old who saw a Lucien Freud and saw no reason why he couldn't have it on his wall, ( _hidden in his bathtub_ ), his moral compass has always been a little off.  
  


 

  
  
Here is a secret: art does not mean what you think it means. Neal learns this at seventeen, reading a book on art theory that he stole from the library of the high school he no longer attends. Art does not mean paintings; art does not mean sculpture. Art means priceless Chinese vases and Japanese swords and tiny Mycenaean pots. Art is 14th Century tapestries and a scrap of the Sun King's slipper and a playbill Aubrey Beardsley once scrawled on, bored. Paint does not make art, history does. Beauty is something else, but that cannot be parsed merely by pencils and ink. Here is another secret: you cannot possess it all, a photo in a book is all you're getting, more than enough. This secret, Neal does not learn. No, this secret, Neal rejects outright.  
  


 

  
  
Neal steals from the moment he is left unattended, which, unfortunately, is younger than it should have been. The thrill is electric, almost painful in its intensity. Neal grows up, and grows up, and his thefts get more daring. It's the family tradition, stealing. His father might have been unorthodox about it, (corrupt cop, lives, not gold), but he's a thief all the same. Neal steals until he gets caught, and then Neal runs.   
  


 

  
  
Neal runs, and finds out that it doesn't really work that way. Neal runs, and the process is continual; imperfect, not aorist. He didn't know when he started running that you never get to stop, now it's all he knows. He lies to himself, tells himself he wouldn't have done it, if he'd known. All that glitters is not gold. But Neal doesn't follow gold, but glitter, and he's lying all the same.  
  


 

  
  
Lying bothers people more than stealing, this Neal also learns. An anonymous thief in the night stealing your Francis Bacon leaves you shaken, a man you thought your friend stealing your grandmother's (priceless) pearls leaves you feeling like your chest has been split open and someone's rummaged around just for fun. It bothers Peter even more than most. Neal still lies. Draw your own conclusions.

 

  
  
  
There probably  _will_  be a movie about his life, is the thing. Frank Abagnale, Jr. got one, and he doesn't have Neal's bone structure. Hollywood will make him a hero, Peter Burke will make him a good man. People will believe almost anything, as long as they want to. That's the essence of the con, the thing that drives the plot. There's something rotten at the centre of Neal, that he's tried to strip out like an apple core. It is no longer 2009, and Neal is no longer trying.  
  


 

  
  
Neal wanted to be a good man, once. He even thought he could be a great man, the FBI's pet felon, an invisible collar around his neck, Peter yanking gently on the chain. (That's not fair to Peter, but Neal's become more spiteful lately.) The system chewed him up and spat him out, or his father did, or both. Neal didn't run, but it doesn't mean he won't. Neal's not a bad man yet, but he's not a good one, not even making the attempt. He thought once that his movie would be a redemption story. There are some things even Hollywood can't redeem, or won't. His jawline won't save him. There's a key to take the collar off, a gun he knows how to fire. Lies, you see. Never let them see you up close. Never let them keep you still. Everything around him glitters, but the bars are gold. It's continuous, you see.

 

  
  
  
Movies can be art, too, you know, and he's always had a thing about  _Bonnie & Clyde_.


End file.
